What I’m Doing for Lent

I hope you had a great weekend, I had an excellent weekend with Mike and our friends Annie and Jon. I’ve known Annie and Jon for years and I don’t see them often enough but after not seeing them for like a year, we went to dinner Saturday night at Bonefish Grill. I LOVE their bang bang shrimp! We all had a great time catching up and we need to remember to see them more often, especially before we move to Wisconsin.

Sunday we made our own date night jar and for dinner Mike cooked Mario Batali’s Orrechiette pasta with spicy sausage and baby broccoli.

The recipe was super easy and tasty with plenty leftover! I watched the show Gypsy Sisters for the first time and WOW is all I have to say. The show is what I would classify a “train wreck” show where you just can’t take your eyes off it!

In Friday’s Top Ten I shared with you all a great shrimp and pasta recipe for the Lenten season. I’m Catholic and every year I abstain from eating meat on Ash Wednesday and all Friday’s through Lent. Sometimes it’s difficult for me because I’m a picky eater but I manage, I just won’t take up vegetarianism sometime soon. In addition to not eating meat I usually try to find something to give up whether it’s swearing, chocolate, peanut butter, etc. My understanding of giving up something you enjoy is so you can better understand what Jesus did for us when he suffered and was nailed to the cross. Now giving up chocolate is nowhere near close to the suffering Jesus went through but when you’re 7 years old, it seems like it.

This year I decided not to give up something for Lent but decided on some good practices for during Lent and after. These things will make me a better person and model Jesus’ behavior toward others and at the same time will benefit other people. Here are my good practices:

Do nice things for Mike such as leaving a small note for him, buying something he would like, complimenting him and encouraging him during his half marathon training

Don’t make comments about women’s weight such as “have you lost weight?” Society tries to give us this image of a super skinny woman as an ideal figure and that’s not correct. Why should we focus on a women’s weight all the time? As a woman, we focus on it enough already we don’t need to address it even more. Rather than commenting on someone’s weight, even if they have lost weight, I’ll try to compliment someone on their hairstyle if it’s new or what they’re wearing like “that dress looks great on you”.

Keep in touch with my friends, send a friendly text every once in awhile, invite them to breakfast, lunch or dinner more often. (I’m really bad at this.)

Don’t judge someone by their looks or make comments about them. Like I was taught when I was little, you shouldn’t judge a book by it’s cover and I should do this in regards to people as well.

Going along with the last point is to not talk bad about someone or gossip. This is something we learned when we were little, “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all” but I know I should practice it more often.